Jeckles Geek Blog

That is the question that is in my mind, I think.  Day and night, just below consciousness the question is there.

What I am going to do now?

It’s more that just a question of finding something to occupy my time.  I realize that the very way I’ve defined myself for the last several years is in question.

The very way I think about things is no longer adequate.  I have no idea how I am, what I want or what to do about it.

Peopel say helpful things like, “You need to meet people.”

No shit.  Why didn’t I think of that?

I know they mean well, but of course I need to meet people… I just literally don’t know how.  And no, a list of place where people could be found will not help.  I know that people are out there.  I just don’t know how to talk to them in such a way that a conversation turns into friendship.  I wasn’t good at then when I was younger… and I haven’t got any better.

Part of me says, just relax it will come in time….

And that is probably true, but I worry.  What if while I am waiting for things to work out, I turn into a lonely guy who lives in his lonely apartment and nothing more.

I don’t want that happen.  I want this to be opportunity… or something.

But for what…

I know these posts sound like a broken record.  There is a good reason for it.  The question I hear whispering in my head (all day, everyday) keeps gnawing at me.  I only hope that talking about it ‘outloud’ will help to answer it.  Or silence it.

Tagged Adjusting, Depression, Divorce, Winter Blues | Comments (5)

I don’t want to paint a picture that is all doom and gloom.  I’m not miserable all of the time.  It’s just that when things get hard… sometimes they get really hard.

When I realized that this is how it was going to be, I was sure that living alone would be the hardest adjustment.  I’ve never lived alone before.  I’d always had a a roommate or something.   I was afraid that coming home to an empty house would be the most depressing and lonely thing ever.

As it turns out, that part has been fine.  I kind of like it.  My new is home is a very small (no… what ever you are picturing… smaller) one bedroom apartment.  It will never be great for entertaining, but it works for now.  It’s clean and cheap.  I’ve got it set up fairly well… considering.  My brothers and parents got me a nice 32″ LCD TV for Christmas and I’ve been able to watch my Netflix and a little TV if I feel like it.

On a typical work day, I come home, check my Facebook, Twitter and IM to see what my friends are up to.  I make a little dinner.  Okay, who am I kidding, I make a big dinner.  Usually with bacon.  Sooner or later, I will have to think about eating healthy, but I’m not there yet.  I watch a little TV, maybe listen to some music and read a book.   I’m at peace with it.

But on days off… weekends, snow days, holidays, it’s a different story.  Sometimes I have one or both of my kids and that is great.  But the rest of the time, I’m alone.  And while I have plenty that could keep me busy, books to read, photos to edit, music to download, comic books to read and organize, chores to do… the loneliness overwhelms all of it.  Instead of doing any of the things I could do or even just deciding to relax and do nothing, I obsess on the loneliness.

I check Facebook and IM to see if there is anyone to talk to.  I pace.  I talk to myself.  Out loud.  A lot.  People tell me that I need to get out there and do something.  Easy for them to say.  We’re having the worst winter I can remember, getting out isn’t as easy as you might think.  But that’s only the beginning of the problem.  What exactly am I supposed to get out and do.  Go drive some where, by myself, and be lonely in a different place?

Go to a bar, club, whatever?  I don’t drink, I shouldn’t drink and I won’t drink.  And sitting at a bar nursing a soda, hoping that I might be able to find some one to talk to… that doesn’t sound any better to me.

I understand the problem, it’s simple really.  I’ve spent the last 10 years being a family guy, in my quiet way.  I didn’t go out and do things, I didn’t hang with the guys and play poker or anything like that.  And now, when you take the family part of it, there is a gaping hole that I’m not sure how to fill.

I need to adjust.  I need to figure out who I am now.  Still a family guy in some ways, but different now.  I need to meet people.  I need to figure out what I want to do.  And this has been hard on me.

It’s not all negative.  Saturday night I went with a coworker to go so Furthur in concert.  And that was a much needed excursion.  And sooner or later, this winter will end.  Then I can go camping.  Backpacking, if I can get in shape.  And somewhere along the way, I’ll meet people and reconnect with others.

But in the mean time, I’m adjusting.  And sometimes it is hard.

Tagged Adjusting, Divorce, Winter Blues | Comments (1)

I know that I’ve said on numerous occasions that blogging is dead, but here I am.

As imperfect a medium as this is… and it really is… it’s the one I know.  And I have a lot of stuff I feel that I need to work out.  So here we are.

My wife and I separated after Thanksgiving.  People seem to believe that when I use the word ’seperated’ that it implies the possibility of this being temporary.  It’s not.  It’s over.  Apparently, it’s a process.  You seperate. You get lawyers.  You divorce.  I’m not clear on the details yet, but I’m not clear on a lot of things these days.

What happened?  Who knows.  Nothing really.  It’s been over.  For a long time.  It just became the right time to acknowledge the reality of what was happening.  She told me over a year ago that she wanted it over.  She was right, but I was fixated on the concept.  I didn’t want to be divorced.  I should have been asking myself, ‘do you want to be married?’

After more than a year of ’staying  together for the kids,’ the reality that I didn’t want to live like this finally set in.  And here I am.

I’m not sad that we split up.  It was the right thing to do, I feel that with every fiber of my being.

But I’m not really happy either.  I am trying to be.  Trying to stay upbeat and  positive.

Laugh it up.  A lot of you that know me here, there or in the real world don’t think that I have it in me to be positive.  You are wrong.  I want to be positive.  I want to believe that things are going to get better.  That this change is actaully just what I needed.  And a lot of the time, I DO feel like that.

But other times, it gets overwhelming.  I’ve spent the past decade working towards a set of goals, an ideal, that has evaporated.   And I find myself asking, Now what?

The reality is simple, in the real world I don’t have any real friends, I haven’t really socialized.  I was a family guy. Go to work, come home and be with the fam.  I have some sort of network of people here on the internet.  But most of  them are a lot like acquaintances.  The long and the short of it is this:  I suddenly find myself alone, out of my element and with no clear idea what I should do next.

I can’t keep on like this.  I work.  I come home and do nothing.  Several well meaning folks have made many suggestions as to what I could do for fun… to get out.  What they do not know or understand are these two facts:

First, I’m broke.  I know, there is a recession, we are all broke.  Be that as it may, we were barely keeping it afloat before, now trying to support two households is straining it to the point of breaking.

Second, I have serious social anxiety issues.  It is so hard for me to talk to people, especially in a large groups of people.   Suggestions like, go to such and such a place there will be loads of people there, are extremely stressful to me.

When I explain this… I often get the response, I was just trying to give you some advice… you don’t have to take it.  The thing is, I don’t really need advice, at least not like that.  I know what I want to do.  It’s just hat I don’t know if I can do it.

So much in my life has changed.  It’s not like going back to before I was married.  I am a different (and hopefully better) person than I was then.  It’s starting over from scratch.  And I’m not sure where to begin.

So for starters, I’ll write about it.  And we’ll see where it goes from there.

Tagged Depression, Divorce, Starting Over | Comments (4)